J 11 Twin Sister

I prepped this block way before Christmas and finally finished it this week. J 11 Twin Sister is appliqued using the back basting method.

Opinions needed :-).....updates at bottom

I have a dilemna with a quilt I'm working on for a charity project with one of my quilt groups. I found this huge piece of cheerful pansy fabric at a yard sale last summer and thought to use this for my borders. I decided to use Bonnie Hunter's Boxy Stars pattern which I had already used to make a quilt before. These are the fabrics I chose to do the stars and the white with a little tiny red bud is the background. I added a gold for the center:


I found this wonderful wide pink flannelette for the backing:

Now the problem is, the pansies don't really seem to work for a border??? Or will they??? (Just to clarify...there is no sashing between these blocks yet...that white is just my design wall :-).

This is the first quilt I did with this pattern. So, can I get away with the pansies border? If so, what colour sashing and what colour corner stones? The background of the pansies fabric is navy blue.

My theory is that maybe I should have mixed purple and navy in with the green and red? Maybe it would have worked then? I also need to make sure this thing won't look like Christmas! I can use any other colour for the border instead of the pansies, but since that was my focus fabric, I'd really like to use it :-). But, I won't be offended if you all think I should put the pansies out of my head and use something else LOL. Thanks for any advice you can give!

First idea is in....purple sashing with gold corner stars. I only have two purples in my stash! The light one would be enough for sashings and the darker one might just be enough for dark purple corner stones?


Closer up of the purple sashing (I could put another narrow border around the whole quilt before the borders...gold?):


I sewed all the four patch units together today and cut some purple sashing of the proper width and also found some cool dark purple with gold hearts on it for the corner stones. I'm liking it more and more! I like the gold between the border and purple sashings as well, but only have a little bit of that left :-(.

Close up:
Don't know if you can see this very well, but at the bottom is a different gold print which I have in my stash. It is not as bright as the corner stones, but there would be lots there for a 2" border around the whole quilt between the pansy border. If you click on the picture, it should enlarge and may give a better view. Or should I look for a brighter gold for the border or go with something totally different?

Thanks to Cyn's comment, I cut some 2 1/2" squares for the cornerstones from the pansy fabric. I didn't fussy cut them because they are very large, but just let the print fall wherever. I'm liking that a LOT! That really seems to tie everything together. I also cut a couple 2 1/2" strips of the background fabric of the stars and put that along the outside for an additional narrow border. I'm liking that too.

If you click on this picture, it should enlarge so you can see the light narrow border a bit better:

I tried the yellow border just to see what it would look like, but it looks dirty compared to the lovely gold in the centers of the star blocks. I think the decisions have been made unless I get real opposition to the above picture :-).

Doll hat

My poor doll doesn't have any clothes yet. I just don't get around to making her a little sleeper. Someday! My friend Joan knits little hats and sells them on her blog. I ordered one for my baby (doll :-) and it fits perfectly. Now I really should make my poor baby some clothes! At least her head's warm now and I can always wrap her up in a quilt.


Here is the back of the hat:

FINISHED!!!

I finished the last block for my Psalms quilt! Hurrah! Feels good to have the blocks completed. Now to figure out a layout. That may be awhile since we're moving at the end of March, so life will be a bit upside down til we get settled. But, the blocks will sit safely in my binder til I can get at them again. That willl give me some time to think about the setting. This block is called Peace and Plenty and is based on Psalm 122.

Two more Psalms blocks

I'm on the homeward stretch with the Psalms blocks!! I finished two more blocks. This one is King David's Crown based on Psalm 138. I chose purple for royalty :-).



And this block is based on Psalm 8 and called "Starry Path".

I'm 1/4 of the way on my very last block...can't believe I'm so close to actually getting the blocks finished. Now to decide how I'm going to set the blocks. I'd really like to put the references on the front of the quilt somehow, and would love to do embroidery on black, but that would be a lot of work. Printing on the computer would be another option. Will have to ponder some ideas. To see other Psalms blocks on this blog, click on the 'label' at the bottom of this post.

And, here's how I pressed it!

I ended up pressing the block quite symmetrically with the points of the four diamond shapes going towards the center. That worked quite well. There's a bit of a 'bump' there, but it makes the center gold part of the block stand out nicely, so this will be it. My friend, Joan, has a wonderful professional iron which just gives a shot of steam when you press the button. Worked great. Thanks to all who offered good advice.

Now to finish the chatelaine!

Any ideas on how to press this block?

Just finished a 5" block for a chatelaine for our London Friendship Quilt Guild. I have had the kit for 2 years, but finally got the block finished. It had so many fiddle fussy pieces in it that I decided to hand piece it. However, I took one look at the back of it and I have no idea where to start pressing! Any ideas?

This is roughly what the front will look like...it'll look much better after it's pressed, I'm sure :-).

Christmas dress for Kara

Here is the Christmas dress I made for my youngest granddaughter, Kara. It's made of velveteen.


She's just so huggable in her soft, fuzzy dress :-). It's big enough that she can probably wear it next Christmas as well.

"New" vintage machine Bernina 614

My friend, Nancy, picked up a machine at a yard sale and took it home, but it was seized up, so she donated it to Jake. He fiddled with it for awhile and got it freed up and sewing again. I finally cleaned it up and oiled it and took it for a test spin. I got a cabinet from my friend, Amy and it fits perfectly. It's an interesting machine in that it's a Bernina, but totally straight stitch. Here is the machine in the cabinet:


As you can see, the cabinet has a few issues. It probably comes out of a school home ec class judging by the style and the initials scratched into the front! Obviously someone didn't like home ec class :-). I cleaned it up with an elixir and paste wax and it spruced it up quite nicely. I kind of like the heritage marks on it.

The head is a very retro looking green. It sews nicely so far. It also has the option of dropping the feed dogs so I'll try free motion quilting on it next.